3 Tips for Optimizing Your External Links
At first, external links seem counterproductive to the overall goal of your website’s blog content. You want people who read your content to stay and check out your other services and products. Clicking an external link redirects readers to another site, which is generally not what you want.
However, external and internal links are an important part of online marketing and web design. They show a source for your information, boost your Google rank, and help build your influence online.
Here are three tips for optimizing your website traffic with external links.
- Use Appropriate Anchor Text
Anchor text refers to the part of the sentence containing a link. This text should always be relevant and related to whatever the linked page contains. It should also blend in with the rest of your article, or it will seem like you’re encouraging readers to leave your website.
Exact match anchor text is an important part of SEO optimization, as well. Internal links help make your site’s structure clearer to search engines and help readers navigate to related pages. External links give you more authority and entice other websites to link back to you in their own content.
- Avoid External Links to Competitors
Chances are good that your competitors are putting out similar content to yours. You may think that using their information helps to improve your own content at their expense, but it actually provides a connecting line to their website. The last thing you want to do is send your potential customers over to a competitor.
Instead, find scholarly links or informative articles about your topic. Statistics are a great way to show the numbers behind your services. Bloggers are another great resource for your social media marketing, especially if they don’t offer services in your field of work.
- Link to Big Websites
Some of the largest websites in the world gain receive billions of visitors every month. Facebook alone has a user base of over 2.9 billion. These websites are powerhouses that yours would benefit from if you gained their attention through external links.
Even though it may seem contradictory to link to bigger websites in your industry, you’ll put yourself on their radar. Do it often enough, and they’ll notice and take action. If you’re lucky, they may start linking to your pages in their content and sending their own visitors over to your page.
On a similar note, don’t ignore smaller websites and bloggers. It’s a great way to build up your network and backlinks to commercial content.
Optimize Your Links
Proper use of external links is essential if you want your content seen as dependable and accurate. Only using internal links can give the impression that your company is self-centered and dismissive of other sources of information. You would also end up isolating yourself from other influencers who could benefit your brand.
Check out our other articles to read more about finance, tech, and how to boost your website traffic.
